Shreveport, Louisiana is a long way away from Salem, Massachusetts, where the action on the witch-centric TV series Salem takes place, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t just as haunted.
“During season one, almost every single cast member got injured, and I remember one of the producers wanted to call in a shaman,” says Elise Eberle, the actress who plays Mercy Lewis on the series. “They thought something supernatural might be happening.”
It never quite came to that, however, but Eberle says she’s still keen to have her own close encounter. “I want to believe in dark ghosts so badly,” she says, “and I’ve been so open to it, but it’s never come to me.”
What has come to Eberle is a meaty role on a beloved series, one that began its anticipated second season earlier this month. And she’s plenty grateful.
“My character undergoes horrific changes this season, things get really complicated,” she explains. “Mercy, especially for me, is an emotionally taxing and physically demanding role, but she really allows me to dive deep. I get to incorporate movement and body awareness and physicality, which is so exciting and gratifying for an actor.”
The entirety of the series so far has been filmed in a four-acre town outside Shreveport built especially for the series—costume-bedecked locals are on set as extras—but Eberle says she’s hoping the cast gets the opportunity to visit the show’s namesake locale.
“One of the writers actually lives in Salem,” she says. “I think that it’s a hoot; it’s perfect. I think that we all should go and visit her, we should actually see the real village and where all the history began!”
